1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to apparatus for terminating flat electrical cable. In particular, the invention resides in apparatus having means capability for selectively orienting pairs of cable conductors into a parallel arrangement in the vertical plane.
2. The Prior Art
For many electrical interconnection applications, it is desirable from both an economic and performance standpoint to utilize flexible flat transmission cable. Typical cables comprise a plurality of conductors which are coplanarly arranged in a predetermined horizontal configuration of ground and signal conductors. For example, the ground and signal conductors in such a cable may be alternately arranged G--S--G--S--G . . . ; or the cable may provide double ground conductors between each signal conductor as in a G--S--G--G--S--G--G . . . arrangement. Use of these cables, however, has been restricted because of the difficulty in achieving connectorized cable end termination. Problems have been encountered due to the fine gauge of the conductors involved, the close center line spacings between adjacent conductors and the inability of the industry to achieve tooling which could mass terminate closely spaced conductors.
Several connector concepts have been proposed for terminating the types of transmission cable described above. One connector approach envisions the termination of a flat cable having two adjacent ground conductors between each signal conductor by the insertion of each adjacent ground conductor pair into a single terminal slot. Intuitively this approach has great appeal, but achievement of tooling for accomplishing such a termination has heretofore been futile. The adjacent conductors, to be commonly terminated, should ideally be transposed from the horizontal plane represented by the cable, into a mutually vertical orientation prior to termination. Such a transposition, however, must not interfere with termination of the adjacent signal conductors; nor can it result in damage to the conductors. Moreover, the tooling must orient the conductors in a cable in a dependable fashion, without binding. Also, the tooling should be compatible with standard automation techniques in order to achieve cost effective mass terminations.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,260,209 discloses a connector of the type described above and rudimentary termination tooling for said connector, and is hereby incorporated by reference. The termination apparatus comprises a standard press having modular tooling for mass insertion of cable conductors into a connector cover. While this apparatus works well and has been generally well received by the industry, certain shortcomings prevent it from representing an ideal solution to the termination problems outlined above. Specifically, the preorientation of dual ground wires prior to the termination thereof cannot be assured to any great degree of certainty. Also, the horizontal to vertical transposition of the dual ground wires is often inhibited by a binding of the conductors as they are jointly inserted into the connector cover.